Court's Keyword Academy Login

Some have had trouble logging in to their account to view the videos on Courtney Tuttle's Keyword Academy Keyword Crash Course. This is a page (hopefully) linked to from a comment I left there. The reason for this post is that several complaints on that site area forum relate to login and getting access to the videos. I had the same problem. But I discovered the problem. There are two log-in areas. The most evident one is the WRONG one. The correct one can be a little difficult to find.

First -- Yes I know this blog sucks. It has a pagerank of PR1, and gets ZILCH traffic. It was set up long before I heard of Court and Court's Internet Marketing School and The Keyword Academy. And, since it ostensibly covers a huge area, not a niche, there is not much I can do with it. I'm just keeping it for the occasional AdSense click. Since Internet Business, e-Commerce, whatever, is such a hugely competitive area, I am unlikely to attempt a more focused blog in this area. That being said, with a few keywords, here is the login procedure:

Log-in procedure for Court's Keyword Academy:

Go to:
http://thekeywordacademy.com/

Click on "The Keyword Crash Course" on the blue menu bar.

That gets you to:
http://thekeywordacademy.com/crash-course/

You will see a "Login" link at the very top right.
THAT IS NOT THE LOGIN LINK YOU WANT.
It will take you to a WordPress login page.
Your attempts to login on that page will FAIL.

The page you want to go to is:
http://thekeywordacademy.com/coaching/

In the right sidebar, just below the calendar,
is where you log in.

After that, you will still be on the "coaching"
page, but you will be logged in.

Then, you can click on the video links in the
sidebar to view them.

The Internet e-Commerce Biz Buzz Website Has Been Updated

The Internet e-Commerce Biz Buzz website has been updated.

Discover the truths it's vitally necessary for you to know about article marketing, SEO, email promotion, link exchanges, and more, if you are to have a chance for success in internet marketing your home business.

You will find a cleaner design and easier navigation.

You will find featured e-commerce articles linked to from the sidebar.

The latest article provides to you free the user document for the
"BEMM™ PHP eMailer Bulk e-Mail Mailing PHP Scripts"

You will find more Internet Business Marketing articles in expanded articles directories:
Contributed e-Commerce articles , General articles .

Also see the Internet Business Glossary for some new explanations of e-commerce business terms.

e-Commerce Business (Internet Business Biz Buzz) Website Updated

The e-Commerce Business (Internet Business Biz Buzz) website has been updated. Articles have been updated and reorganized. Navigation has been made easier with a new, cleaner sidebar. All articles are easily accessible. An expanded search facility (Google Search) has been added so you can search for and find on the site the pages having words or phrases you are interested in.

Take a look at the Internet Business Glossary, for example.

Disabling Comments in Munius Article Directory PHP Script

I am questioning the value of the James Brausch Munius article directory submission PHP scripts. I am doing that because I have not gotten many good article submissions to my Munius article directories. Probably 95% are porno spam.

Update 2009-06-18: No longer using or supporting Munius, and no longer offering products to "fix" it.

Frankly, I don't know if the Munius article directories are doing me much good or not, but I am keeping them for the time being. In the meantime, to keep the article data directory under control, I have a script program I use (which is also available for sale for your use). (deleted.) With my PHP scripts, I, and you, can permanently delete all those spam articles after rejecting them during article moderation.

My script also removes rejected and unconfirmed comments. Probably 99% of them are porno spam. What I am getting are totally useless -- and time and resource consuming.
1) 99% of them are spam
2) An e-mail box has to be monitored.
3) Some extra clicks of my (link deleted) Munius Packing PHP script program are needed to get rid of them permanently -- get rid of the clutter -- from from the article data directory.
So, I have concluded: Why have comments at all in the Munius article directories?

I have rid myself of the problem by modifying the Munius scripts to completely remove the ability to add comments, and thus to eliminate the need to moderate them.

Three scripts require simple modifications:
a.php
index.php
misc.php

Details -- the actual PHP code modifications -- are shown on my e-Commerce Business website in the article entitled "Munius Article Directory Spam Comments Disabling"

Pulling the Plug on Relusi - Looks Like Brausch Did

James D. Brausch had (has?) a PHP script product called Relusi which sets up a resource directory on your site. It was (is?) for the purpose of building reciprocal links. Links out and links back (backlinks).

I no longer recommend Relusi, for reasons detailed below. Bottom line, if you want to participate in a likely much better link exchange method, I suggest you look up "Easy Google Ranking".

Anyway, I wasted a lot of time setting up Relusi on several of my sites. I wasted a lot of time modifying the "look and feel" - the skin. I wasted a lot of time learning about the script so I could make a couple of minor user aids. I wasted a lot of time making an add-on to clean up the article files.

Then, I and some others discovered that somehow - cause unknown - massive corruption would occur, eliminating many links. So I disabled new submissions to my Relusi directories.

One philosophical problem with Relusi is that there is no enforcement of reciprocity. Someone puts a link in your directory. They are are supposed to link back to you. That is a pain in the "a" for the person putting a link on your site, so most don't do it. So they get back links but you don't. Now, Relusi does request a URL you can check to see if they really did backlink, but that is a pain in the "a" for you to verify. Relusi does not offer any automated verification, other than testing for a valid e-mail address at time of submission. And there is no ongoing verification of even your links out to the requesters' sites. I addressed that in a previous post.

Another philosophical problem is: Are reciprocal links all that valuable in the first place? I don't know. Some gurus say yes, others no. One way links, but enforced by a third party service, look to be a more sound method of getting back links.

Brausch himself obviously does not think much of Relusi

Back when Brausch had Relusi on his main blog, his Relusi directory was a mess, full of spam links. One would think that he would have at least maintained it to be a "shining example" of the product. Now, the Relusi directory on that now inactive blog redirects to another of his new blogs (home page). And I can't find Relusi on that new blog or a couple more of his blogs. 'Nuff said?

Relusi and Other Resource Directories Full of Broken Links?

It is reputed that Google will penalize you if you have too many broken links on your sites. As with all things Google, who outside of Google really knows? But, it can't hurt to play it safe and clean up your sites, including resource directories.

I have found that a huge source of dead links on my sites is the Brausch Relusi Resource Directories (a link exchange program). This post is directed mainly at those using Relusi, but everyone can benefit from finding and deleting all kinds of dead links.

For the complete article, visit my site
Relusi and Other Resource Directories Full of Broken Links?

Some snippets follow, but for the complete article, in context, go the link above.

Because of too many problems with Relusi, some time ago I disabled new linking. See why and how at:
Brausch Relusi Resource Directory New Link Request Disabling

However, I have kept existing links in the Relusi subdirectories, FWIW. Since they are static, over time many links have gone obsolete, cluttering up the directories.

So I decided that it was finally time to clean up the broken links.

There are many link validators out there. If you search on Google, you will find 1,830,000 results for "link validation" (without the quotes). I figured I may as well use an authority, the W3 Consortium W3C Link Checker version 4.3 (c) 1999-2006 W3C to find them...

Bye Bye Brausch?

Looks like James Brausch is going to "retire".

He's been flipping a bunch of domains for $500, based on his remaining cachet. Obviously beefing up his expat fund (expatriation fund).

If you don't know what an expat is, see:
PT Philosophy and Five Flags Theory

Actually, can't blame him for seeing the necessity of that. He has posted several times recently about the Texas FLDS being raided by the Texas so-called Child Protective Services. Religious wacko that he is, he is right about the U.S. A lot of us non-lefty-loony "unbelievers" see the same problems. Of course, nothing much better anywhere else now. A race to the bottom by all governments.

I guess Brausch figures Costa Rica will maybe last a little longer.

Gary Scott likes Ecuador. He also is a successful internet entrepreneur. Check him out if you are looking for a "guru fix" who actually offers courses and information of value.

Keyword Targeting on Niche Sites for AdSense Income

What about niche sites to generate AdSense income? How much can you make?

Niche sites are small sites -- 5 to 10+ pages -- targeting just one keyword (key phrase).

The idea is that with a niche site, you can more easily get on the first SERP page -- even the #1 position -- for the keyword you are targeting.

It's better to be on the first page of SERP results for a moderately competitive key phrase rather than on the 10th page for a highly competitive keyword.

You want to look for a balance of potential searches for your keyword and the number of competitors.

For some "back of the envelope" calculations of your income possibilities with AdSense on a niche site, considering number of visitors, CTR, etc., see Keyword Sniping Income Projections.

Profitable Prices - Glyphius Pricing Digits Scoring

Profitable Prices - Glyphius Pricing Digits Scoring.

Pricing digits are the digits used in setting prices for various products.

The question is: Which are the best digits to use? It depends.

For example, which, in general, should give a better response: $19.95 or $20.00?

Well, according to Brausch's Glyphius (version 2.0b2), yes $19.95 is better than $20.00. But, $25.00 is better than $24.95. And $24.50 is better than either.

I've gone and tablulated a large list of prices and their Glyphius (version 2.0b2) scores.

For a big list and comments, go to
Profitable Prices - Glyphius Pricing Digits Scoring.

RaSof - My Last Word About It...

RaSof - My Last Word About It...

Unless I see some reason to make me change my mind, why bother writing more? For me RaSof (Ranking Software) didn't work. Scoring others' pages with RaSof gives scores having no relation to SERP (search engine results page) location/ranking.

As I said about a year ago on my site at $1000 a month for Brausch's Ranking Factors (RaSof)?.

My conclusion from those results is that if you have no links, even an EXCELLENT RaSof score will do you no good. OTH, if you do have links, a good RaSof score is NOT necessary.

Look for my RaSof commentary and details on my e-Commerce Internet Business website.

My previous blog posts regarding RaSof are archived at:
http://e-commerce-biz.blogspot.com/2007_05_01_archive.html
http://e-commerce-biz.blogspot.com/2007_04_01_archive.html
http://e-commerce-biz.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html

Now, Fred Black weighs in with his excellent and detailed post "Search Engine Optimization - A Reader Asks My Opinion of Rasof" on his site at http://www.pqinternet.com/126.htm

Aside from his discussion of RaSof, it looks like Fred is working on a program or system to actually DO what RaSof promised. Since Fred has been consistently at or near position #1 in Google for the highly competitive keyword (keyphrase) he has targeted -- internet business -- I'm looking forward to seeing what he comes up with.

"Why Work?" Report Updated

"Why Work?" Report Updated

I've just made some minor updates to my "Jobs Suck. Why Work?" report.

They comprise reformatting and navigational changes for easier reading, and updating and adding a couple of links about alternatives to the job.

For those of you that have not heard of this report, it is derived from an article written quite a few years ago by someone probably from a now long-defunct MLM company. (I have no idea who the original author was, otherwise I would have credited him/her.)

I've heavily edited this report from that article. The original article discussed superbly the PROBLEM, but the solution offered in it was to join that now defunct MLM company which, in my opinion, had one of the worst compensation (pay) plans I've ever seen. It seemed to me a blatant attempt at a "quick hit." Whether they succeeded and took the money and ran, or failed and quit, I don't know.

Regardless of that, the discussion of the problem and the reasons to participate in MLM were superbly stated. My revision has been to update a few of the numbers, to do some general editing, to delete the references to their particular MLM plan, and to make the report "generic."

The report emphasizes MLM, but MLM is not the only -- nor, IMNSHO, the best -- alternative to the the J.O.B. (job). What is important is that you find SOMETHING as an alternative to the job.

I have added a few links to alternatives to MLM (aka Network Marketing), such as an internet business and stock market trading. (I myself am concentrating more and more on stock market options trading.)

More at this URL: The Why Work Report.

Brausch No Longer Selling Glyphius Directly

If you reached this post by clicking on a link to find out more about James Brausch's Glyphius copy scoring (copywriting) software, sorry. It is no longer available from Brausch directly. He states that effective 2008-01-04, he will no longer be selling it directly, but only through resellers. You will have to search on the web to find a reseller. The price will be somewhere north of $100, as that is the wholesale price to the resellers.

Brausch Relusi Resource Directory New Link Request Disabling

Update 2009-06-18: I no longer use, recommend, support, or act as an affiliate for Brausch's Relusi (or Munius). More trouble than they are worth. I am leaving this page up for reference only. Not even updating links. This is dead to me.

Because of a tremendous number of spam link requests and because of continuing corruption of the "status" data files, due to those spam link requests, I have disabled further submissions to my Relusi Resource Directories (Relusi Link Directory Software).

If I thought those directories were really doing much for traffic to my pages and/or AdSense clicks and/or my product sales, I would look into rewriting or adding to the Relusi PHP script code. That would involve adding input validation routines, for example.

(Fred Black's web scripting course teaches you how to do that fairly easily. But for Relusi, even with his course's help, that is more than I am interested in doing.)

DISABLING RELUSI

If you are interested in disabling future Relusi submissions, but you want to keep the links you have already gathered, here is what I have done.

FIRST, I created a new "throwaway" e-mail address to put into "misc.php" (approximately line 6).

SECOND, since I have even received spam Category Addition requests, I deleted on the server all the category submission related php files. I deleted:
addcatsubmit.php
addcatthankyou.php
approvecat.php
approvecatsubmit.php
approvecatthankyou.php

I edited "addcat.php".
That editing was for two purposes.
1) To to notify people what is happening re that page, and give them some links to other places on my site.
2) To eliminate 404 errors and Google broken link problems.

THIRD, I disabled new link requests by deleting on the server:
submit.php
thankyou.php

I edited "submitsite.php".
That editing was for two purposes.
1) To to notify people what is happening re that page, and give them some links to other places on my site.
2) To eliminate 404 errors and Google broken link problems.

CLEANING UP THE CATEGORIES

There is a possibility that your link categories may be corrupted .
Download the "category.txt" and "newcat.txt" files from the data directory.

See if there is anything in the "newcat.txt" file that you want to add to the "category.txt" file and add it. Then clean out the "newcat.txt" file, just leaving one blank character, and upload that back.

Edit the "category.txt" file, putting the categories in the order you want them to appear, one category per line. Make sure all trailing spaces on each line are eliminated. After the last category, go to the next line, but make it empty. Upload the file back.

NOW, IF YOU HAVE DISCOVERED THAT PREVIOUSLY APPROVED LINKS NO LONGER SHOW, THAT IS A DEFINITE INDICATION THAT YOUR "STATUS" DATA FILES ARE CORRUPTED.

If you want to repair your data directory, this is a bit complicated. You will have to download from your data directory the status files "emailconfirm.txt" and "moderate.txt", edit them, then upload them back. (FTP.) You will have to eliminate on the server the link files you don't want, for whatever reason (usually spam links).

I'm going to give you the simplest way to do it. But it will be the most time consuming.

Look in your data directory on the server and note what is the highest numbered link file.

Edit the "emailconfirm.txt" file so that it is comprised of all "Y", one "Y" per link file.
Add a "N" at the end.

So, short example, if the last link file was number 5, the emailconfirm.txt file would be:
YYYYYN

Upload that to the data directory.

Edit the "moderate.txt" file so that it is comprised of all "A", one "A" per link file.
Add a "N" at the end.

So, short example, if the last link file was number 5, the emailconfirm.txt file would be:
AAAAAN

Upload that to the data directory.

Now, you will have to log in to Relusi in moderate mode and go through the "reject" procedure for the links you don't want.

Note that you cannot just delete link files on the server. If there are any gaps in the numbering, no link past a gap will be displayed.

Now, if you want to permanently delete the rejected links, you can use my packer script, Relusi Link Exchange Data File Packing PHP Script. My script deletes the rejected files, renumbers the rest as necessary, and adjusts the status files. Because at the time I developed that software I was unaware that Relusi was susceptible to data directory corruption, it is strongly advised that you save a copy of your entire data directory to your local hard drive and that you REPAIR THE STATUS FILES FIRST, and moderate, before using my program. If you run it without repairing the status files, many otherwise good link files could be PERMANENTLY deleted without any possibility of recovery. (Unless you can get your host to recover them from THEIR backup files.)

TEXT EDITING

Note: All editing should be done with a TEXT editor such as Notepad or something better like Crimson Editor. (BTW, I don't make a dime on recommending Crimson Editor. It is free, but donate a few bucks to the author; it's worth it.)

MORE ON DISABLING

A major point regarding editing "addcat.php" and "submitsite.php" is that you MUST disable the "Submit" buttons. You can do that by editing or changing the PHP script, or at least commenting out the "Submit" buttons in the code.

For examples, see (deleted).

Brausch Relusi Resource Directory: Hackable, Corruptible.

I will be gradually, as I get to it, removing affiliate links on my sites for the James D. Brausch Relusi Link Exchange Directory PHP script software.

Not that taking space to promote that P.O.S. did me any good, anyway.

FWIW, I am still offering my Relusi data file packer PHP script, for those who may still want to "fight the good fight" trying to keep their Relusi Link Directory straightened out.
Update 2009-06-18: No longer offering that. Relusi -- fuggedaboudit!

WHY?!! Why do I no longer recommend the Relusi PHP scripts?

I have discovered that the Relusi PHP script and data directory construction allows hacking or corruption of the data (the link files). That is a huge pain in the ass to fix.

If I still thought that having "Resource Directories" on web sites was worthwhile, maybe I would try to figure it out and fix it if I could. I would offer a fix, as I have previously, including offering the Data File Packer script. But I do not think it worthwhile to bother.

If Brausch doesn't think it worthwhile to fix his product, why should I? It would be a much more major endeavor for me to fix it, and then if he did fix it and sell an upgrade, that would mean I would have wasted even more time on it for nothing.

Maybe an even more important reason is that it seems to me that Google does not really value you and I having link directories on our sites. Anymore. If ever.

Look at it this way: Did you ever happen across a link directory and say to yourself, "Oh, goody, a link directory -- with all kinds of completely unrelated links -- I wonder what I will find here -- I'll just browse at random instead of going to Google or Ask.com to look for something I'm specifically interested in..." Well, I sure don't say that to myself.

Here's a basic question which I should have asked myself a year ago when I got all enthused about link directories in general, and Relusi in particular: "Why would Google think they are a good thing for Google to consider in providing the best search results to a browser's search query?" I don't think Google thinks they are.

Anyway, here is the major problem with Relusi in particular:

Previously accepted links mysteriously become "not reviewed." Even more dangerously, the "confirmed" status of many links becomes "not confirmed". This is due to corruption of the emailconfirm.txt and moderate.txt data status files. Running my packer script then removes what were previously accepted links, because the status files now say they are no good (unconfirmed),

For awhile, I thought maybe that corruption was due to new link requests not in proper format (the Brausch script has no format checking of what goes in each submission form entry box). Or maybe it was because someone who previously submitted a link resubmitted with the same a-mail address or URL and something in the code got confused because of that.

Now, since I no longer value the directories, I thought, "Just in case these directories really are of some value, I'll just fix up the directories. I'll keep them for now, but I'll disable future submissions (and changes) so I don't have to waste more time cleaning them up over and over." As a test, I edited the submission form script file for one of my directories to disable submissions/changes. I then cleaned up the data status files, moderated new submissions, ran my packer script to delete rejected links, and then verified manually that the files were all OK.

Everything was OK as of last night when I finished. This morning, the status files were once again corrupted, along with one new (spam) link request. That new spam link request was not formatted correctly. It got into the data directory, and the data status files in the data directory again got corrupted, even though I had disabled new/revised submissions. I can only conclude that the James D. Brausch Relusi PHP software is wide open to hacking.

My next step is to remove all Relusi files not directly used in displaying existing data (link files). If I get any comments to this post, I'll let you know what the results of that is. If the data status files again get corrupted, that will be a definite indication that the data files are hackable - being hacked - that it's not just the bad formatting of link requests that is the problem. (But I still am not going to try and fix it.)

Dumping Relusi and Munius - What Do You Think?

My previous post: Relusi - Serious Problem - Brausch Resource (Link) Directory - I have come across a serious problem with the James D. Brausch Relusi Link Exchange Software.

That post outline a problem with Relusi. Someone else reported to me a similar problem with Munius.

I had not looked at my Relusi directories for my sites for a couple of days. After fixing the data file corruption reported, I had 200 links approved and confirmed for one of them. For another site I had 83 links approved and confirmed. Looking at them today, they are corrupted again. The corruption starts at link 69 on one and link 68 on another.

Just took a look at yet another directory: That had a different number of links to start with, and it is also corrupted starting with yet another starting link number.

Anyway -- I have had Relusi and Munius installed for 8 or 9 months. As far as I can tell, THEY HAVE NOT DONE ME ANY GOOD AT ALL in building traffic to my sites.

Are there ANY success stories out there for those using either of those products?

I am thinking of dumping them as being more trouble than they are worth. What do YOU think? Comments are open.

Update 2009-06-18: I have long ago dumped both Relusi and Munius -- P.O.S.

Relusi - Serious Problem - Brausch Resource (Link) Directory

I have come across a serious problem with the James D. Brausch Relusi Link Exchange Software.

This software, aka the Relusi Resource Directory software, is comprised of a set of PHP scripts that you upload to your web site server. Underneath that is a "data" directory which holds the links as individual files, and two additional files - status summary files. One of these status files holds the moderated status (not reviewed, accepted, rejected) for each individual link file. The other file holds the confirmed status (confirmed, not confirmed) for each individual link file. (Confirmed status means that the link requester has provided a legitimate e-mail address, to which the software sends a message requiring the requester to respond to it so that the link will show in the directory when it is confirmed.)

The problem is either that the data directory is easily or inadvertently subject to hacking, or there are serious errors in the PHP script coding that leads to corruption of the moderated status and confirmed status files in the data directory.

I have no idea what, specifically, the problem(s) is/are. I have a couple of suspicions:

One is that there is perhaps a problem in the code for the feature that supposedly allows a submitter to delete and/or update his listing. Perhaps that screws up other listings and/or the status files.

The other is that spam submittals (submittals not in the proper format in each of the submittal form text boxes) may screw something up.

In any event, I have noticed several times that the status of link submittals I have previously accepted have mysteriously reverted to "not reviewed" status. And this is not just one or two submittals, but dozens. To fix it, I have had to download the summary files, edit them back to accepted and confirmed, then upload them again. This is faster than going through each submittal individually. I have had to do this several times.

Now, if instead, you just go through each link request to accept they still may not be confirmed status if the confirmation file was also corrupted.

Because of these problems, I started keeping a record of the last good post number, and its subject, so when I went into moderation, I could see what is happening.

This post is already too long, so, bottom line, just one example:

I have a Relusi directory that has 228 links confirmed and accepted, a couple of days ago. Today, 133 of those links had been reverted to "not reviewed". It turns out that the confirmed script was also, unbeknownst to me, corrupted. That directory now has only 97 confirmed and accepted links.

That really pisses me off. First, I have lost a lot of links, and second, my script to get rid of spam links now deletes good links, because of the corrupted data directory status files.

For some time, I thought Brausch had some good stuff. In actuality, none of his stuff that I have tried, with the possible exception of Artemis Pro has turned out to be worth a crap.

Update 2009-06-18. No longer using any of Brausch's crap, including Artemis.

Another Google Slap -- Page Rank Hits

There's been a lot of buzz lately about the latest "Google Slap" -- the downgrading of "Page Rank" (PageRank) for thousands of sites.

I don't pretend to know what it is all about; it's all too complicated for me, but for more information, see the link below to John Furst's site.

My take on all this is that I want to thank Google for helping me to reinforce my decision to de-emphasize this web biz cr**p in favor of re-emphasing my stock market endeavors.

I thought stock trading was hard, but I have made orders of magnitude more money in stocks than in this e-biz.

I got into e-biz as I thought it would be both interesting and good $ for part-time endeavor. (I only wanted to do it part-time.) It has instead turned into a time-consuming monster with a negligible "hourly $ rate" return.

And, I thought playing stocks was complicated. This is vastly moreso.

Thanks again, Google, for your manipulation and lack of transparency. Thanks for smashing my AdSense revenue about a year ago. Thanks for screwing with me (and others) again, now that my AdSense and other revenue has once again approached what it was then. Thanks again for encouraging me to spend less time and effort on e-commerce, and more on my stock trading and stock trading software.

Here is the link to John's blog, which discusses this in more detail and provides more links.

MLM Being Replaced by Affiliate Programs?

MLM has always sounded good in theory. But the great majority of compensation plan implementations are designed to appeal to hype and hope hucksters and starry-eyed MLM-of-the-Month wannabees. All those wanabees think they are going to get rich by getting others to sell for them. And those others also think they are going to get rich by getting others in turn to sell for them. And so on down the line, with the result that hardly anyone sells anything.

It is not profitable for the average person to try to sell anything in most MLMs. The compensation plans are structured so that recovery of promotional and recruiting costs by average distributors is nearly impossible. He gets too little a share of the commission pie. So, the distributor in a typical MLM Payplan is dependent on a large downline to put him into profit since direct customers/distributors themselves are not profitable.

The reason for this is that too much of the sales dollar goes upline to the founders and their "heavy-hitter" buddies. Too little of the commission pie goes to the people nearest the sale -- the person actually responsible for the sale and his sponsor.

Affiliate selling has come on strong because usually only ONE level of commission is paid. That way, the person actually responsible for the sale gets an affiliate commission of 30%, 40%, or more, even up to 80% or so, depending on the product. The affiliate gets more than the typical MLM 5% or 10%, since most of the commission money does not go upline, as in a MLM plan.

Some affiliate programs may have up to three levels. But even with these plans, the commission structure is usually simple. There isn't the typical MLM legerdemain that sounds so wonderful to the naive.

My hard-hitting report, "How to Evaluate a Network Marketing (MLM) Opportunity" is a must read if you insist on getting into or remaining in MLM. It is vital that you know what to look for in order to avoid wasting hundreds, thousands of dollars and time trying to promote losing programs. Buy it; it's worth orders of magnitude more than its minimal cost.

What's Your Google Page Rank?

You can find out easily what the Google Page Rank (PR) is by going to the bottom of my site main page (link below). PR10 is the highest possible, attained by very few, if any. More common are lower than PR5. Pages that don't have any PR at all used to be listed as PR0, but now as N/A.

Pages with a rank of N/A may still be indexed by Google, but you are very unlikely to find them in the top ten PAGES of search results, much less in the top ten overall search results, for whatever your search term is. (Of course, if your search term/phrase is very specific to your page only, it will turn up, but that won't do you much good as others would be not be likely to search on that specific term/phrase.)

Here is the link: e-Commerce Business (Internet Business Biz Buzz) Web Site

Sign up for Notification of New Posts to this Blog

I finally got around to adding a sign-up function so you can get on my e-mail list to get notices of new posts to this blog.

That is thanks to Fred Black's "Web Scripting Home Study Course" that enabled me to implement it in much less time than trying to figure it out on my own. His course shows you how to implement PHP scripting and javascript to create e-mail list sign-up forms and other web forms.

Look for the "Updates" related link at the top of the right column on this page. Go ahead, give it a try, and click the link. That will take you to a web page on my site that will allow you to sign up. It will acknowledge your submittal on that page, and will also send you a "thank-you" e-mail. You then can click a link there to get right back to this blog.

For my article with a little more about my e-mail sign-up scripts, see "Web Scripting for Profit" on my website.

Update 2009-06-18: While I still recommend Fred's course in general, I am no longer using the Sign-Up function I developed using what I learned from him. It is simply a matter that I got too many invalid (spam) requests.